Farmers volunteer to help in rebuilding

BACOLOD CITY—Volunteer farmers and technicians from Negros Occidental province are helping to rebuild and rehabilitate farms in Leyte province that were destroyed by Supertyphoon “Yolanda.”

They hoped their efforts would boost the morale of the farmers and bring their life back to normal, especially when aid stops coming, as well as trigger a movement of farmer volunteers from nearby provinces, said Ramon Uy Sr., an organic farming pioneer in Negros Occidental.

The Department of Agriculture has estimated the damage wrought by Yolanda to the agriculture sector in Eastern Visayas at P3 billion.

The volunteers are presently at St. Benedict Farm Institute of Sustainable Agriculture in Alang-Alang, a second-class town (annual income: P45 million to P55 million) more than 20 kilometers from Leyte’s capital of Tacloban City, which was among the hardest hit by the typhoon.

They are from Humayan Ministry, the Bureau of Plant Industry-La Granja Station, Eco-Agri Development Foundation, Puro Organic Corp. and RU Foundry and Machine Shop Corp., all based in Negros.

The group brought organic fertilizer, corn and rice seeds, fast-growing vegetables, equipment for the production of organic fertilizer, water pumps, botanical sprays against dengue and a small tractor, Uy said. Carla P. Gomez, Inquirer Visayas